In both Paris and Boston, local political leaders justify their politics by referring to “participatory democracy” as a way to facilitate the inclusion of immigrants into city policy-making. Beyond this rhetorical convergence, there are crucial divergences about these politicians’ respective actual goals and method of functioning : the experience is relatively positive in Boston, whereas the Parisian one is a patent failure.

These differences can be underlined notably by advancing the following hypothesis: MONB, as a city department, has managed to build a partnership with civil society, particularly with ethnic grassroots organisations, whereas in Paris, the Socialist Party's top-down CCPNC - a consultative council - is part of a political communication that is destined to its Green political allies and to public opinion at large.

Boston (Massachusetts) and Paris are two important cities of immigration in which the political majority of each municipality is at the origin of top-down governmental bodies dedicated to immigrants: the Mayor’s Office of New Bostonians – MONB (1998) and Conseil de la Citoyenneté des Parisiens Non-Communautaires – CCPNC – Citizenship Council for Extra-European Parisians (2001). In this context, a comparison can be made both internationally (U.S./France) and locally (Boston/Paris).

The study is divided into four main parts. The first part deals with a local comparison of the two cities’ main geographical, demographic and political contexts. A very limited number of convergences – notably the rhetoric used by local political leaders-, is to presented in a second part.

Then, the third part is concerned with and identification and an analysis of the two urban experiences’ divergences : differences of objectives -, and differences of functioning methods, linked in turn to different political models. In the fourth and last part, the study tries to explain the signification of the “participatory democracy” concept and its reality in the North-American and French contexts, this in turn will enable us to link the national level with a local comparison.

The researchers find differences of objectives - the Parisian experience is highly influenced by the supra-national political context of Europe concerning the issue of local voting rights for immigrants in Europe-, whereas the Bostonian experience is essentially local and deals with groups’ interests of the local pluralist political system, in which new immigrants is a component ; and differences of functioning methods –narrow partnership between MONB and ethnic grassroots associations and other local actors of the civil society, in contrast to CCPNC which is a consultative council composed of one hundred and twenty councillors who are all nominated by the city mayor.

Then, the researchers establish a connection between the two cities’ divergences and North-American and French local governmental models : in a Tocquevilian perspective that underlines U.S. characteristics such as local self-government and the fundamental and relatively independent role of associations, the study noticed that local actors in Boston, notably ethnic grassroots organizations, inherit this democratic political tradition. In contrast, Paris City Hall’s CCPNC, as a consultative structure that is controlled by the municipality, reflects a French centralized and political organization which is turned towards “representation” as the main national and local source of legitimacy.

Université Paris IV Sorbonne
Linda Chaib (Researcher)

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01/02/2004

Linda Chaib

research

Urban Policy > Social inclusion & integration > Community development

Citizens' participation